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Invisible Creature Design Talk at The Casbah

Josh Higgins of Neat Neat Neat brings designers to San Diego to inspire, and inspire they did. Don and Ryan Clark of the Seattle-based (and Grammy nominated) graphic design studio Invisible Creature descended upon San Diego Saturday, April 2nd to lead a design talk at The Casbah, followed by a live performance by The Black Heart Procession. Having spoken in many a hall and classroom before, the artist-musician brothers called this a welcome opportunity to share their design inspirations in a rock club -- and at the legendary Casbah no less.

Ryan and Don Clark of Invisible Creature

With their iconic album cover designs and monster-filled works, the brothers Clark seemingly live in a surreal world – which is perhaps a key to their appeal. But I’d also attribute their charm to all they have to say about the world around them; their passion for the creative process is addicting. Here are some of the inspirations I walked away with.

The power of the archive

It seems designers have a compulsive need to collect, and Don and Ryan Clark are no exception, tracking down objects and images at estate sales and in vintage books, and filing them away in their archives to be resurrected at a later time. The final design for the Foo Fighters Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace album cover was a product of this hoarding process, Don said -- with two distinct images from the archive seamed together in a fit of inspiration.

Don and Ryan describe their grandfather (an illustrator who worked for NASA for 25+ years) as a driving force behind their venture into commercial art (or in their words, “drawing and getting paid for it.”) Not only do they harbor some artistic genes from the past, but they also carry the style of the old times into their work, citing Mid-Century modern design as a major inspiration.

Arcade Fire City With No Children Poster

They were also able to use their process to transcend time with the old-fashioned styling for The Chariot music packaging.

After photographs were taken of the band members in antique wear, the photographer took separate shots of metal pieces based on the studio’s sketches for placement. The designers then superimposed the metal photographs on the portraits, adding effects to make them look like paintings.

And of course, as the brothers jump through the decades of design inspiration – being the sharp-witted creatives they are -- they don’t allow the changes in the design environment to go unnoticed. (See Ryan’s rant about the modern Trix cereal box, for example.)

Immersing yourself in your world

Their parting advice: “Immerse yourself (and fully understand) the world you want to be in.” In their case, that world was music. Being musicians themselves and designing album covers for friends who ended up landing record deals launched them into the sought-after realm of music packaging design. They credit their success to their multi-disciplinary nature and being in the “right place at the right time”. (And how about a whole lot of talent?)

Now, without skipping a beat, they've entered their latest world: toys. As they described their long-time obsession with vinyl toys and cartoons (in particular the art of Monsters Inc. and The Incredibles), it became apparent that what began as an obsession soon became their destiny. As they allowed the monsters to infiltrate their poster designs, it was not long before they began designing the toys they so coveted -- including the endearing characters of Leroy C. For Super7 and a soon-to-be-released toy character for the Sasquatch Festival.